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Preprint submitted on 30 Dec 2010
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Zigzags in Turing machines
Anahi Gajardo, Pierre Guillon
To cite this version:
Anahi Gajardo, Pierre Guillon. Zigzags in Turing machines. 2010. �hal-00460662v2�
Zigzags in Turing machines ⋆
Anah´ı Gajardo
1and Pierre Guillon
21
Departamento de Ingenier´ıa Matem´ atica, Universidad de Concepci´ on, Casilla 160-C, Concepci´ on, Chile anahi@ing-mat.udec.cl
2
DIM - CMM, UMI CNRS 2807, Universidad de Chile, Av. Blanco Encalada 2120, Santiago, Chile pguillon@dim.uchile.cl
Abstract. We study one-head machines through symbolic and topolog- ical dynamics. In particular, a subshift is associated to the system, and we are interested in its complexity in terms of realtime recognition. We emphasize the class of one-head machines whose subshift can be rec- ognized by a deterministic pushdown automaton. We prove that this class corresponds to particular restrictions on the head movement, and to equicontinuity in associated dynamical systems.
Keywords: Turing machines, discrete dynamical systems, subshifts, formal lan- guages.
We study the dynamics of a system consisting in a finite automaton (the head) that can write and move over an infinite tape, like a Turing machine.
We use the approach of symbolic and topological dynamics. Our interest is to understand its properties and limitations, and how dynamical properties are related to computational complexity.
This approach was initiated by K˚ urka in [1] with two different topologies:
one focused on the machine head, and the other on the tape. The first approach was further developed in [2,3]. More recently, in [4,5], a third kind of dynamical system was associated to Turing machines, taking advantage of the following specificity: changes happen only in the head position whilst the rest of the con- figuration remains unaltered. The whole evolution can therefore be described by the sequence of states taken by the head and the symbols that it reads. This observation actually yields a factor map between K˚ urka’s first dynamical system and a one-sided subshift.
In [4], it has been proved that machines with a sofic subshift correspond to machines whose head makes only bounded cycles. We prove here a similar char- acterization of machines with a shift that can be recognized by a deterministic pushdown automaton. Moreover, we establish links between these two properties and equicontinuity in all three spaces.
In the first section, we recall the definitions and fundamental results. The second section is devoted to defining the different dynamical systems associated to one-head machines, and to stating basic results about equicontinuity within
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